Valenti: TV reducing violence

The entertainment industry “is ready to assume its responsibility” and has already taken steps to reduce violence on TV and in films, Motion Picture Assn. of America president Jack Valenti said Sunday.

“There is a great current running through the creative community trying to do something about violence, to make it politically incorrect,” Valenti said on “This Week With David Brinkley.”

Congress and the Clinton administration have threatened to take action to regulate TV and movie violence as the nation searches for solutions to the epidemic of violence on its streets.

Valenti said, “The entire film and broadcast industry is working right now … in a continuing effort over the next year to exile gratuitous violence wherever it exists.”

Valenti said he was “befogged by all the research” on whether TV violence is responsible for real-life violence, “but I say, why take chances.”

Actor Tom Selleck agreed that Hollywood bears a responsibility for its product. “I’m not sure Sen. (Paul) Simon or Janet Reno would be better arbitrators than the public in what we should see,” Selleck said on the ABC show.